Standing Committee B

[Mr. David Amess in the Chair]

Waste and Emissions Trading Bill [Lords]

Michael Meacher: I beg to move,
That the Order of the Standing Committee [3rd April 2003] be amended as follows— 
 (1) in paragraph (1) (Committee's sittings to be on 3rd, 8th and 10th April at 8.55a.m. and 2.30 pm), for ''and Thursday 10th April'' there shall be substituted '', Thursday 10th April and Tuesday 29th April''; 
 (2) in paragraph (3) (proceedings in the Committee to be brought to a conclusion by 5.00 pm on 10th April), for ''Thursday 10th April'' there shall be substituted ''Tuesday 29th April''.

John Hayes: The Programming Sub-Committee had an agreeable meeting. Debate is progressing in a positive way. It seemed appropriate to have additional sittings, so that we can give the Bill proper and full scrutiny.

Norman Baker: Ditto.
 Question put and agreed to.

Clause 17 - Strategy for England

Question proposed [this day]: That the clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill. 
 Question again proposed.

David Amess: I remind the Committee that with this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
 Clause 18 stand part. 
 Clause 19 stand part. 
 Clause 20 stand part.

New clause 1 - Strategies for dealing with flytipping: England

'.—(1) The Secretary of State must have a strategy for— 
 (a) reducing the amount of waste which is flytipped, and 
 (b) extending the powers of local authorities and the Environment Agency to deal with flytipping. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Secretary of State must— 
 (a) consult the Scottish Ministers, the National Assembly for Wales, the Department of the Environment, the Secretary of State for the Home Office, the Environment Agency and the Mayor of London, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to him to be representative of the interests of local government as it considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to him to be representative of the interests of industry as it considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as it considers appropriate. 
 (3) The Secretary of State must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Secretary of State must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Scottish Ministers, 
 (b) the National Assembly for Wales, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 2 - Strategies for dealing with flytipping: Scotland

'.—(1) The Scottish Ministers must have a strategy for— 
 (a) reducing the amount of waste which is flytipped, and 
 (b) extending the powers of local government and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency to deal with flytipping. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Scottish Ministers must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the National Assembly for Wales, the Department of the Environment and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to them to be representative of the interests of local government as they consider appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to them to be representative of the interests of industry as they consider appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as they consider appropriate. 
 (3) The Scottish Ministers must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Scottish Ministers must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the National Assembly for Wales, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 3 - Strategies for dealing with flytipping: Wales

'.—(1) The National Assembly for Wales must have a strategy for— 
 (a) reducing the amount of waste which is flytipped, and 
 (b) extending the powers of local government and the Environment Agency to deal with flytipping. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Assembly must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the Scottish Ministers, the Department of the Environment and the Environment Agency, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of local government as it considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of industry as it considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as it considers appropriate. 
 (3) The Assembly must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Assembly must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the Scottish Ministers, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 4 - Strategies for dealing with flytipping:

'.—(1) The Department of the Environment must have a strategy for— 
 (a) reducing the amount of waste which is flytipped, and 
 (b) extending the powers of local government to deal with flytipping. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Department must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the Scottish Ministers and the National Assembly for Wales, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of local government as it considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of industry as it considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as it considers appropriate. 
 (3) The Department must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Department must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the Scottish Ministers, and 
 (c) the National Assembly for Wales.'.

New clause 13 - Strategies for recycling and waste reduction: England

'(1) The Secretary of State must have a strategy for— 
 (a) setting of statutory targets for the recycling of waste streams from (i) households; (ii) construction and demolition waste; (iii) business, 
 (b) developing a mandatory doorstep recycling scheme in all local authorities within a period of 5 years, 
 (c) developing the market for recycled materials and goods in parallel with the increase in collected materials. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Secretary of State must— 
 (a) consult the Scottish Ministers, the National Assembly for Wales, the Department of the Environment, the Secretary of State for the Home Office, the Environment Agency and the Mayor of London. 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to him to be representative of the interests of local government as he considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to him to be representative of the interests of industry as he considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as he considers appropriate. 
 (3) The Secretary of State must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Secretary of State must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Scottish Ministers, 
 (b) the National Assembly for Wales, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 14 - Strategies for recycling and waste reduction: Scotland

'(1) The Scottish Ministers must have a strategy for— 
 (a) setting of statutory targets for the recycling of waste streams from (i) households; (ii) construction and demolition waste; (iii) business, 
 (b) developing a mandatory doorstep recycling scheme within 5 years, 
 (c) developing the market for recycled materials and goods in parallel with the increase in collected materials. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Scottish Ministers must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the National Assembly for Wales, the Department of the Environment and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to them to be representative of the interests of local government as they consider appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to them to be representative of the interests of industry as they consider appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as they consider appropriate. 
 (3) The Scottish Ministers must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Scottish Ministers must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the National Assembly for Wales, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 15 - Strategies for recycling and waste reduction: Wales

'(1) The National Assembly for Wales must have a strategy for— 
 (a) setting of statutory targets for the recycling of waste streams from (i) households; (ii) construction and demolition waste; (iii) business, 
 (b) developing a mandatory doorstep recycling scheme within 5 years, 
 (c) developing the market for recycled materials and goods in parallel with the increase in collected materials. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Assembly must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the Scottish Ministers, the Department of the Environment and the Environment Agency, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of local government as it considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of industry as it considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as it considers appropriate. 
 (3) The Assembly must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Assembly must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the Scottish Ministers, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 16 - Strategies for recycling and waste reduction: Northern Ireland

'(1) The Department of the Environment must have a strategy for— 
 (a) setting of statutory targets for the recycling of waste streams from (i) households; (ii) construction and demolition waste; (iii) business, 
 (b) developing a mandatory doorstep recycling scheme within 5 years, 
 (c) developing the market for recycled materials and goods in parallel with the increase in collected materials. 
 (2) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsection (1), the Department must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the Scottish Ministers and the National Assembly for Wales, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of local government as it considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of industry as it considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as it considers appropriate. 
 (3) The Department must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsection (1). 
 (4) The Department must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (3), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the Scottish Ministers, and 
 (c) the National Assembly for Wales.'.

New clause 17 - Strategies for zero waste: England

'(1) The Secretary of State must develop a national strategy for zero waste. 
 (2) The Secretary of State will set out in regulations a requirement upon local authorities to develop zero waste strategies within 5 years. 
 (3) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2), the Secretary of State must— 
 (a) consult the Scottish Ministers, the National Assembly for Wales, the Department of the Environment, the Secretary of State for the Home Office, the Environment Agency and the Mayor of London, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to him to be representative of the interests of local government as he considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to him to be representative of the interests of industry as he considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as he considers appropriate. 
 (4) The Secretary of State must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2). 
 (5) The Secretary of State must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (4), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Scottish Ministers, 
 (b) the National Assembly for Wales, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 18 - Strategies for zero waste: Scotland

'(1) The Scottish Ministers must develop a national strategy for zero waste. 
 (2) The Scottish Ministers will set out in regulations a requirement 
upon local government to develop zero waste strategies within 5 years. 
 (3) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2), the Scottish Ministers must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the National Assembly for Wales, the Department of the Environment and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to them to be representative of the interests of local government as they consider appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to them to be representative of the interests of industry as they consider appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as they consider appropriate. 
 (4) The Scottish Ministers must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2). 
 (5) The Scottish Ministers must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (4), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the National Assembly for Wales, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 19 - Strategies for zero waste: Wales

'(1) The National Assembly for Wales must develop a national strategy for zero waste. 
 (2) The National Assembly for Wales will set out in regulations a requirement upon local government to develop zero waste strategies within 5 years. 
 (3) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2), the Assembly must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the Scottish Ministers, the Department of the Environment and the Environment Agency, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of local government as it considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of industry as it considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as it considers appropriate. 
 (4) The Assembly must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2). 
 (5) The Assembly must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (4), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the Scottish Ministers, and 
 (c) the Department of the Environment.'.

New clause 20 - Strategies for zero waste: Northern Ireland

'(1) The Department of the Environment must develop a national strategy for zero waste. 
 (2) The Department of the Environment will set out in regulations a requirement upon local government to develop zero waste strategies within 5 years. 
 (3) Before formulating policy for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2), the Department must— 
 (a) consult the Secretary of State, the Scottish Ministers and the National Assembly for Wales, 
 (b) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of local government as it considers appropriate, 
 (c) consult such bodies or persons appearing to it to be representative of the interests of industry as it considers appropriate, and 
 (d) carry out such public consultation as it considers appropriate. 
 (4) The Department must set out in a statement any policy formulated for the purposes of subsections (1) and (2). 
 (5) The Department must, as soon as a statement is prepared for the purposes of subsection (4), send a copy of it to— 
 (a) the Secretary of State, 
 (b) the Scottish Ministers, and 
 (c) the National Assembly for Wales.'.

New clause 30 - Zero waste strategy

'(1) The Secretary of State shall— 
 (a) within twelve months put before Parliament a strategy to deliver a year on year decrease in the volume of waste sent to landfill that shall be commensurate with statutory reductions in the weight and volume of waste sent to landfill as required by Clause One; and 
 (b) report to Parliament as to progress by area, every twelve months thereafter and that report shall detail the amount by both weight and volume. 
 (2) The strategy to decrease the volume of waste sent to landfill shall ensure that the volume of waste sent to landfill shall be reduced according to a formula, which the Secretary of State shall specify, which accurately measures the significance of waste by volume against waste by weight.'.

Norman Baker: Welcome back to our proceedings, Mr. Amess. We have had a long debate on many of the issues, so I shall say little about clause 17 stand part except to reiterate my view that the Government's so-called strategy is a strategy for complying with the EU landfill directive rather than delivering a waste strategy—or even a waste hierarchy. Although the Minister wishes it to be a narrow Bill, I make the point again that taking one part of the waste hierarchy in isolation will have an effect on other parts of it, and not necessarily as the Minister and other hon. Members, especially on the Opposition Benches, would wish.
 I turn to new clauses 1 to 4, on fly tipping. We seek to require the Secretary of State to have a strategy for reducing the amount of waste that is fly-tipped, extending the powers of local authorities and the Environment Agency to deal with fly tipping, and to consult relevant bodies, including the devolved regions, before finalising that strategy. 
 I hope that the Committee accepts that fly tipping is a scourge upon our land, particularly so in the countryside. The problem seems to be getting worse, but partly for the right reasons—the Government have rightly increased the landfill tax, and are making it more expensive to deal with waste. The unwelcome consequence of that, however, is that more people are choosing to behave illegally; they are fly-tipping their waste rather than dealing with it through the proper, legalised channels. 
 I draw the Committee's attention to a parliamentary answer that I received from the Minister on 4 March. I asked him to quantify the amount of material that had been fly-tipped for the 
 most recent year for which he had figures. The figures that he supplied were rather shocking. In 2001, 2,900 tonnes of white goods were fly-tipped in the countryside, as were 5,600 tonnes of furniture, 94,000 tonnes of green waste, 8,500 tonnes of general household waste, 380,000 tonnes of construction and demolition waste, 118,000 tonnes of cars and 8,500 tonnes of tyres. That is more than 0.6 million tonnes of material in one year. I should be interested to know how the Government managed to measure all that, but assuming that the figures are accurate, that is an horrendous amount. Those of us with urban areas in our constituencies—probably most of the Committee—will know that fly tipping goes on there too. It is a major problem. 
 The Minister might say that it is illegal to fly-tip. However, as with many such problems, regardless of whether the sanction is satisfactory, the chances of the perpetrators' being caught and prosecuted are certainly not satisfactory. People fly-tip in the expectation that they will get away with it. To be fair to the Ministry and to the Environment Agency, it is difficult to be in all places at all times and to pick up when people are fly-tipping in hidden locations in the country. Nevertheless, again according to parliamentary answers from the Minister on 20 March, 0.6 million tonnes of waste was fly-tipped in the countryside in 2001. However, we learn from the Environment Agency that there were only 225 prosecutions relating to all that waste. One hundred and eighty-seven individuals were fined a total of £158,857—less than £1,000 each—and 38 businesses were fined £144,000, or some £4,000 each. The chances of being caught and successfully prosecuted by the Environment Agency for depositing fly-tipped material in the countryside are minimal and the fines if one is caught are ludicrous—particularly for a business. The odds are that a business that is being fined £4,000 for fly tipping would have paid that or more than that to deal properly with the waste in the first place. 
 I hope that the Minister will take the issue seriously. He needs to have a strategy, as new clauses 1, 2, 3 and 4 suggest, in order to get a grip on the issue. That means that, first, he needs to identify where waste is being fly-tipped—what the trends are—and to look at more powers for either local authorities or the Environment Agency for prosecution purposes. He needs to start thinking innovatively as, in some regions, the Environment Agency is—for example, by putting closed circuit television in locations where fly tipping is a recurrent problem. If he does that, we might be able to send out the message not simply that fly tipping is antisocial but that those who fly-tip have a good chance of being caught, prosecuted and fined in a way that they will find not particularly attractive to their purses and pockets. That is not the situation at the moment. 
 I can tell the Minister of one location in my constituency, just outside Lewes, where there is a tremendous problem with tyre dumping. The general view is that it is undertaken not by individuals but by businesses, because the volume suddenly increases massively overnight. There is a disused chalk pit, 
 which is now reckoned to be the site of ''Mad Max III'', because at the last count it contained 27 burned-out cars. Dumping is a major problem throughout the country and I see no evidence that the Government have managed to get a grip on it, although I do not underestimate how difficult it will be to do so. However, MPs continually receive complaints about the matter in their postbags—I certainly do in East Sussex. Therefore, I hope that the Minister will respond positively to new clauses 1 to 4. 
 New clauses 13 to 16 deal with recycling strategies. I do not propose to spend long on them, except to draw attention to their merit. I have already spoken about them under an earlier grouping, where they would have been more appositely placed, so they have been covered. However, I draw the Minister's attention to clauses 17 to 20, the four other Liberal Democrat new clauses in the group, which suggest to the Minister that it would be advantageous to adopt a zero waste strategy. The Minister may say that a zero waste strategy is pie in the sky, or he may say that the Government are moving towards it through a combination of measures that are already in the Bill. I could write the Minister's reply for him, but I suspect that his civil servants can do that without my help. 
 However, if the Government committed themselves to a zero waste strategy, and the time scale is open, they would send out a clear message that it is not enough simply to minimise landfill or to increase recycling, beneficial though that is, but that we need a change in our culture, to use the Minister's phrase. We must ask ourselves first whether what we dump in landfill is waste: it could be a resource. One person's waste is another's resources. 
 I draw the Minister's attention to an innovative scheme in Newhaven in my constituency. The businesses in a business park there came together and identified the waste streams from individual businesses. They found that some businesses were paying for waste to be taken away and disposed of at landfill and that other businesses in the same park were buying materials that had been recycled from that waste. By marrying the two processes, the businesses eliminated the costs of disposal and successfully minimised waste. That is an example of waste minimisation and business competitiveness, and it is the sort of initiative that I would like the Government to promote. 
 I would like the Government to extend doorstep collection to every home in Britain without delay. It astonishes me that the Government are committed to increasing waste recycling yet I have heard no explicit statement recognising that there must be doorstep or kerbside collection for every house in the country. In parenthesis I say that I recognise that there would be a problem with blocks of flats. Nevertheless, the Minister should be making such an overt statement time and time again in response to the issues raised in the private Member's Bill introduced by the hon. Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Joan Ruddock). I know that the Minister is committed to it, but, with respect, we do not hear regularly from Ministers or from the Prime Minister that that is what the 
 Government want. Perhaps the Minister could correct that impression. 
 We need to look at the treatment of mixed waste and to consider limiting disposal contracts to a maximum of 10 years; that point was raised this morning when we discussed incineration. We need to look at producer responsibility; we also need to consider establishing a zero waste agency designed to pull together the threads and to act as a semi-official pressure group. The Minister may say that he is already achieving some of those goals, and I am the first to concede that things are moving in the right direction, but he should not underestimate the political value that comes from encapsulating the policy contained in the zero waste soundbite. A policy of zero waste would send out a message to the public that the Government are committed to tackling the problem of waste. It would drive forward the agenda in Government and in the Departments of some of the Minister's recalcitrant colleagues whose thinking on waste management is less advanced than his. It would also send a message to local government and to business. There is a great deal to be said for adopting such a strategy. 
 I finish by saying that I have considerable sympathy with the Conservatives' new clause 30 and that I await with interest the Minister's response.

John Hayes: I am very grateful to be called. I notice that our numbers are a little depleted—

Michael Meacher: A man and a dog.

John Hayes: No, I would never want to be described as a dog, and I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Mr. Wiggin) is a real man. Perhaps he is a trifle less rugged than my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Gregory Barker), but a man none the less. I have no doubt that the hard core that remains will do its best and that the others will be recovered, reused and recycled.
 These are important matters, and the grouping of the amendments allows for a wide-ranging debate. We have extensively discussed some of the issues already, so I promise not to give a Periclean oration on this particular group. None the less, we must deal with some important matters, and the hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker) spoke cogently about some of them. 
 First, I want to follow through the discussion that we had before lunch about a change of culture on the part of the authorities responsible for waste disposal. By implication, we need an important change of culture on the part of those responsible for waste collection, too. We must therefore change the culture as regards not only landfill and incineration—we talked about those earlier, so I shall not go over that ground—but collection. It is important to re-emphasise that the mode of collection will have a significant impact on the public's habits. If one makes it convenient and straightforward, and explains why one has adopted it, one will facilitate a practical change in public culture. One will also build confidence in the idea that what is being done is in 
 the wider interest—that is, part of a bigger picture. At the moment, people feel that much of their effort is wasted when they attempt to recycle. That view is not entirely correct, but recycled material is not dealt with as well as it might be. It is certainly difficult to get the right product to the right place when it comes to separating materials, and the waste collection authorities must play a key part in that respect. There must be a change of culture on their part. 
 There is a third change of culture—a change of public culture. In uncharacteristically harsh comments earlier, the Minister talked about the public's habits in respect of litter and waste. I do not know whether he remembers that—perhaps he does not remember his harsh moments.

Michael Meacher: I do.

John Hayes: Oh, he does now.

Michael Meacher: Not harsh enough.

John Hayes: He was not harsh enough, he tells us—he is swinging into draconian mode as we get further into our proceedings. However, he is right to say that it is not good enough to put in place a legislative framework that makes demands on disposal and collection authorities, if it is not matched by a change in public attitudes. The hon. Member for Lewes referred to fly tipping, and the dumping of disused cars is also increasing. Indeed, it is a constant problem in my area. Cars are often dumped in dykes by the marvellous roads and byways of South Holland and The Deepings. These can be in relatively isolated, sparsely populated areas. Many of those cars emanated from other places—often, urban areas. They are left where they are for some time, because it is so difficult for the authorities to deal with them. It is a problem of scale, and there is a massive burden on those responsible for towing those cars away and scrapping them. It is not acceptable for us to allow that problem to continue to grow, but it will unless we send a clear signal through the Bill and put in place measures to deter such things.
 Then, quite simply, there is the problem of litter. We should not underestimate it. A small pile of litter, although unsightly, does not cause people great worry. Personally, I find such things quite offensive, but I take rather a Meacher-like draconian view. Overall, however, this is a massive problem. Things have changed during my lifetime. As a child, I remember—although such memories are always tinged with nostalgia—the streets in our towns, villages and cities were much cleaner. The culture was different. My parents would no more have thrown away a tin can or a bottle in the street than jumped off a cliff, because it would have been outside their system of values. That is not the case now. Some people nowadays think nothing of casting down a used tin can or a bottle or other litter that does not degrade easily. Because of the increased use of plastics and other materials that do not degrade, litter in urban and rural areas lies around for a considerable time, spoiling the landscape, causing nuisance and, in the case of glass and sharp objects, real danger. 
 We need a public change of culture that offers zero tolerance. I should like to see zero tolerance for the dumping of cars in ditches and dykes and along roadways, for fly tipping, which has become all too common in lay-bys and isolated areas, and for people who carelessly discard a bag of rubbish through their car window after purchasing a takeaway meal. Driving along, one suddenly sees a car window open and a pile of rubbish thrown out on to the road. I do not know whether other hon. Members have witnessed that, but it is becoming a common occurrence. A generation ago, people would not have dreamed of doing that, so we need a change of culture, extending to the responsible authorities and the people who are causing the problem. We need to send a clear signal to the public. 
 The issue centres on expectation, encouragement and information, and on giving people practical facilities that are easily accessed, so that they can deal with the matter responsibly. That involves waste separation and collection, and the points that have already been made by the hon. Member for Lewes and others, which I shall not labour. It is part of a bigger picture, which includes understanding that, for each individual right, there must be a collective obligation. For each personal indulgence, there must be a social duty. It is about changing habits and style. Those matters are important and, wherever possible, they should be reflected not only in the Bill but in the Government's whole approach to waste management. 
 I want to deal specifically with the new clauses, which bring into sharp focus two important matters that have already been raised. I shall not discuss the large number of new clauses tabled by the hon. Member for Lewes because he has already spoken about them and it would not be appropriate for me to try to trump him with more eloquent advocacy. [Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman smiles, and I know that he takes my remarks in the kindly spirit in which they are meant. However, I shall deal with new clause 30, which focuses on strategy. 
 I pay tribute to my hon. Friends and to the Liberal Democrats, who have repeatedly asked the Minister for a signal that the Bill fits the strategy, because the Minister clearly has one. It is vital that a strategy and provision for regular audits is laid before Parliament, as new clause 30 proposes. That would allow scrutiny and publicity. We said in our last sitting that the publicity associated with such requirements will be an important check on those whose responsibility it is to enforce them. I do not mean local authorities only, but the Government, too. It is important that Parliament—and through Parliament the wider public—can check the Government's performance in meeting the targets and, more broadly, in delivering the strategy that they have devised. That explains subsection (1)(a) of new clause 30. Paragraph (b) deals with measurement of the strategy in terms of both weight and volume, which is the other matter that I want to discuss again. 
 My hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire (Mr. Sayeed) had a prior engagement today, and it is sad that he is not here. He made an important contribution about volume as well as weight, arguing 
 persuasively that unless we included volume, we would obscure the picture, because much waste is bulky but light. He was talking about the packaging, plastic and polystyrene waste with which we are all familiar. That waste does not weigh a great deal, but it is extremely difficult to get rid of and typically does not recycle terribly well, although some plastics do recycle rather well, so one should not use too broad a brush. Unless we include volume in our considerations, we shall miss an important element in the growth of waste. In some senses the growth in such waste is disproportionate because it often consists of packaging waste, which is an escalating problem. Everything that one buys from anywhere now seems to come in an enormous amount of packaging. There was a time when things came in newspaper tied up with string, which was happily recycled. That is no longer the case. Waste measured by volume as well as by weight is important and, once again, new clause 30 deals with that. 
 In essence, that is the strength of my case. There should be parliamentary and wider scrutiny. Parliament must play a key role in challenging and auditing the Government's strategy, and that strategy must record measurement by both volume and weight. I suspect that the new clause would facilitate the three-way change of culture that I described earlier.

Anthony D Wright: There are downsides to the argument about waste as measured by weight and volume. A paper pulp manufacturer in my constituency manufactures egg cartons, which are considerably heavier than the new plastic cartons. One could probably get 10 plastic egg cartons to one paper pulp egg carton. The proposals would give an unfair advantage to the plastic industry, even though paper is biodegradable and breaks down. The hon. Gentleman's argument would therefore prevent the company in my constituency from being competitive in the market and would probably work against other paper pulp manufacturers.

John Hayes: I was about to say that I thought that that was an extremely good point, but my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster tells me from a sedentary position that he thinks that it is not and is, I suspect, about to intervene on me to say why.

Bill Wiggin: The point that the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Mr. Wright) made was entirely reasonable, and I think that my hon. Friend is about to talk about volume, which is the key point. One problem that we have encountered throughout our proceedings is whether we measure waste by weight or by weight and volume. My hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire has constantly referred to that, and I draw the Committee's attention to his comments about the ratio of volume to weight of 2:1. I think that my hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) will soon mention that.

John Hayes: I was clearly doing so with insufficient clarity, but that was the point that I was trying to make. However, the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth may have something, in that the calculation will not be simple. There will be occasions when the larger package may be more desirable than the smaller, or the heavier package
 more desirable than the lighter. That, I think, was the argument put by the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth.
 We need to measure the likely reuse or recycling of material, or whether it is possible to recover it. That is not as simple as it may appear, but given that we cannot analyse every piece of waste in fine detail at every point of collection and disposal, the volume to weight ratio would at least give us a handle on the increased amount of waste that is large and bulky but not heavy. 
 I am interested in what the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth said. I shall certainly give it proper consideration, and I am sure that the Minister will do likewise. Neither the hon. Gentleman nor I would qualify on either volume or weight, and the ratio would do neither of us much good. None the less, we should probably have it. I shall conclude by saying that the three-way change of culture that I identified is pertinent and necessary; and that would be assisted by what is yet another constructive amendment.

David Drew: I am delighted, Mr. Amess, to serve again under your chairmanship. I shall not keep the Committee long.
 The problem is how to define zero waste. It is a fine notion, in a similar vein to sustainability; both terms are bandied about by those who call themselves green or environmentalist, but they are difficult to include in legislation. I have no problem with the idea of waste minimisation. If we took it to its ultimate conclusion, we would create no waste—we would not have created the item that created the waste—but I am not sure about the concept of zero waste. In a sense, we can achieve zero waste only if we remove many types of production, because they inevitably have by-products, and some of them could be put to alternative and better uses. 
 We must also consider whether there is a way of creating an exchange mechanism whereby people who create waste can buy a form of allowance from those who are more environmentally friendly. I am not sure how that would fit in with the Bill. We need to give the matter a great deal more thought before using the term ''zero waste'', or we shall be creating a wish list, and that may undermine and degrade the very important work that we are trying to achieve. The Committee may like to ponder on that. Perhaps the Minister will give us his definition of zero waste.

Michael Meacher: My hon. Friend raised an important point about definitions. Aspirational targets such as zero waste are rather vague. However, I must not let the moment pass without referring to the speech made by the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings, which was remarkable, not because he gave us the best of reasons to include volume and weight, but because of his panegyric about litter. I thought that I had finally found a soul-mate when he referred to zero tolerance, although he was a little wimpish about the penalties. I thought that he might have recommended the reintroduction of the stocks, but he did not go quite that far. However, his general attitude, which the country needs, about the
 intolerance of laziness and sloppiness is something that is widely shared.
 We are dealing with the new clauses together, because they are all concerned with the production of strategies for waste management. They bring together several issues and I shall try to deal with each of them. They express, once again, the understandable wish of hon. Members to extend the scope of the Bill and to tackle all sustainable waste management issues in one go—I see nods of assent. It might help those hon. Members with large ambitions if explain in more detail how the Bill fits with the wider strategy to bring about sustainable waste management in the United Kingdom. 
 Our vision for sustainable waste management was, I repeat once more, set out in ''Waste Strategy 2000''—perhaps I should circulate it before the next sitting so that my constant pleas do not fall on stony ground—and by the other UK Administrations in their waste strategies. ''Waste Strategy 2000'' gives us the overall framework. It looks at the whole waste hierarchy from waste minimisation to landfill, and it covers all waste streams. The strategy sets out our ambition to break the link between economic growth and increased waste. It also makes it clear that, where waste is produced, we must put it to good use. Although I have said this before and do not wish to keep repeating it, I am vigorous in asserting that it is the right policy. ''Waste Strategy 2000'' is a living document, not one to be archived; it is the framework on which we continue to build in light of further developments, inadequacies of policy or gaps in the strategy. We are delivering, and the Bill is part of that delivery. 
 New clauses 17 to 20 would require each country of the UK to produce a strategy for zero waste. My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew) asked what that means. Zero waste is usually understood to mean that no waste is sent to landfill. In its more radical form it could be zero waste production in a totally closed resource cycle—materials biodegrade, they provide the input for the production of alternative products or they are, in some other way, filtered out of the manufacturing process. However, I suspect that hon. Members mean the former. 
 The latter is a fine concept, and something that we should aim for, but it is an ambitious goal. I fear that we are running away with ambitious goals when our current position is lamentably inadequate. Only when we turn the corner and fundamentally change existing practices can we begin seriously to aim for such goals. However, even this is a hugely ambitious concept, which goes well beyond the scope of the Bill and of the landfill directive.

Norman Baker: For the sake of clarity, I am referring to the latter definition rather than the former. That is not in the expectation that we can achieve it in 10 years, or even in 20, 30 or 40 years. However, I believe that we should aim high; if we aim for 100 per cent. of a goal, we may achieve 50 per cent., and if we aim for 50 per cent., we may manage 25 per cent. We must be clear about where we want to go. Where is the route map—to use an overused
 phrase—and how can we best get there? That is not to say that we expect to get there overnight. However, let us aim high and sell the idea to the population.

Michael Meacher: I am not sure that I wholly agree. I believe in stretching or ambitious targets. However, when one is engaged in a process that is moving all too powerfully in the wrong direction, to set an extraordinarily radical goal in the opposite direction does not inspire greater effort; it just brings the whole exercise into disrepute. That is what worries me.
 I hope that members of the Committee will not continue to regard me as an isolated figure, because I speak for the Government on waste; I insist on that. However, like all Ministers, I want to be practical, and I cannot nail my colours to the mast of zero waste in the current circumstances. I am quite prepared to discuss the matter, but it goes far beyond the Bill and, indeed, the landfill directive. 
 Zero waste to landfill is the more modest definition. It is about not only the management of waste but the lifecycle of products, and we are beginning to take that on board in terms of producer responsibility. The issue is how we, as a society, use our resources. In that respect, I might add that the UK signed up to the world summit on sustainable development. There were five main objectives, the fifth of which was that all participating countries should draw up a plan for sustainable consumption and production. Again, that is an extraordinarily ambitious requirement, but virtually all countries have accepted it. If we think about what we mean by sustainable consumption and production, meeting that requirement would actually go quite a long way towards achieving zero waste. The Government are seeing stakeholders and trying to move in that direction. Significantly, other countries, not only in the EU but much more widely, have signed up to the same objective. 
 Those are important questions, which are linked to the idea of a consumer-led society. In the Bill, however, we should focus on what we can achieve. If I may put a brake on the ambitions of some members of the Committee, we should not try to run before we have shown ourselves and others that we can walk. 
 Reducing our reliance on landfill is, after all, the first step, and the Bill will help to achieve that. We must also accept that some landfill will still be needed. In the next decade, we are unlikely to get remotely near a situation in which we have nil waste going to landfill, but we can begin to turn around the amounts. If we do really well, we may be able to decouple economic growth from the creation of waste that goes to landfill. However, the best practical environmental option for some waste, such as asbestos, is probably to bury it. 
 New clause 30 would require the Secretary of State to put before Parliament a strategy for delivering a year-on-year decrease in the volume of waste—that is part of the decoupling process that I just mentioned—and to report progress to Parliament. It would also require him to specify a formula accurately to measure the significance of waste by volume against waste by weight. The reductions proposed in the strategy would be based on that formula. 
 We had an interesting and lengthy debate on the issue last Thursday, and I said that I would write to the hon. Member for Mid-Bedfordshire about it; indeed, I should probably circulate the letter around the Committee. As I emphasised last week, I am extremely sympathetic as regards the underlying problem that he outlined. To be completely honest, we are not recycling enough low-weight, high-volume items such as plastics. That is probably the weakest point in the whole recycling framework, but I am not convinced that specifying targets using volume as a measure is the right way to solve the problem. Most waste can be, and is, compacted, which makes volume a much less robust measure than weight. 
 That is obvious if one considers the space occupied by a bag of household waste. First, that waste is contained in a wheelie bin, if the authority provides them, as mine does. I am dubious about wheelie bins because they are so large that they encourage people to throw virtually everything bar the kitchen sink into them. The waste is compacted in a dustcart and then it is compacted in a landfill site, where it is subjected to increasingly high pressure as more waste is piled on top. The question arises as to when we should measure volume, and that is not an idle question. Should it be measures when the waste goes into the bin or when it has been at the landfill site for six months? The measure is relative. Compaction of waste once it is in the site is so effective that the volume of such things as plastics is no longer a major issue. 
 There are other problems associated with the measurement of volume. The weight of waste can be easily and accurately obtained from weighbridge readings. Volume can be registered only with reference to the nominal rated size of the container, and part loads in skips or tankers can only be estimated. Using volume as a measure simply is not accurate enough to be of value and for heterogeneous solid waste—which is normal—there are no statistically acceptable factors that link weight and volume. I add the highly relevant point that the last Environment Agency survey on waste arisings had to use estimates of volume where weighbridges were not available. Conversion of those volume data to weight introduced such significant errors that further work had to be done to refine the data. I do not pour cold water on the idea, but there are serious methodological problems.

Gregory Barker: I am listening carefully to the Minister and he is right to point out that there are methodological problems in making an assessment. However, people are just as concerned with the volume of waste at the point of generation as with the volume taken up when it gets to landfill, if not more so. If one wants an holistic solution, one must consider people's concerns about the large amount of space that card, polystyrene or light plastic bottles take up when they are put into the backs of lorries and trundled long distances to landfill. A lot of people are troubled by the space that such waste takes up en route to landfill.

Michael Meacher: I understand that problem, but some compaction often takes place then. I am also interested
 in pursing an alternative way of dealing with plastic bottles, glass bottles or containers, which is to consider seriously the practicality of reintroducing deposit and return schemes. Such schemes reduce litter and give people a personal incentive—not through force, or companies or local authorities—to take things back to either the manufacturer or a container, for which they get some small reward. I do not know why such schemes fell out of use in this country, but I am keen to pursue that idea.
Mr. Wiggin rose—
Mr. Hayes rose—

Michael Meacher: I give way to the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings.

John Hayes: That is most generous of the Minister and entirely appropriate, given our relative seniority—not that I am hierarchical. The Minister has made a good point that deserves the support of all parties, and I am sure that the hon. Member for Lewes shares that view. As the Minister said, it is extraordinary that such schemes have gone out of fashion. We all know from our childhood days that lemonade bottles and other bottles were kept, stored and taken back to get the penny or ha'penny one got for them. That was perhaps the most widely known form of recycling—everyone knew about it and did it. Given the Minister's sensible remarks, which I fully endorse, would he commit himself today to discussing with manufacturers, and perhaps the supermarkets, which do so much harm in other ways, how to make a positive contribution on the issue?

Michael Meacher: Well, I am very glad to say that I am proposing to do that. However, if the hon. Member for Leominster is going to press me, I also tell him that there are problems and that things are not as simple as they look. One problem is that, precisely in order to reduce packaging waste, manufacturers have reduced the thickness of bottles or containers, whether made of glass, cardboard or other packaging material. If the glass is going to be reused by being refilled, it must be thoroughly scrubbed with a chemical to remove any impurities. That will probably be caustic soda. The problem that has been drawn to my attention is that reducing the thickness of the bottle reduces also its capacity to withstand scrubbing with caustic soda. I do not think that that rules anything out—I am sure that it does not—but I am exploring the difficulties.

Bill Wiggin: The Minister will no doubt also wish to explore the distance travelled and the waste and air pollution caused by carting around empty bottles so that they can be refilled. I am not against his ideas on the recycling of bottles; that is just one step.
 I draw the Minister's attention to the challenge of volume. An immediate and easy solution is not essential, but it would not be impossible to measure the volume twice, first uncompacted and then after the waste has been compressed. We could have two measurements, or even three. The Minister can take this as far as he needs to. If we measured on weight alone, we would send out very different signals. I remember the Minister's comment about the wheelie bin; the volume of the bin was the problem because it was too large. 
 Plastic bottles can be a problem. A drinks company in my constituency produces huge numbers of bottles, which it fills with water and soft drinks. It is not necessarily wrong to produce plastic bottles; but if we are going to address the waste problem, we must be more innovative about how we measure the volume. We need to prevent them from ending up in landfill.

Michael Meacher: We are at one in saying that we need to encourage the separation and recycling of high-volume, low-density materials such as plastic. The question is whether setting targets by volume as well as by weight is effective. I would question it. If it was a mechanism rather than another way of measuring, that would be another matter. The question is how to deal with the problem. Why should measuring by volume be of such great assistance when the problem remains to be solved? Compaction or other totally different ways of solving the problem are the right way forward. There is an increasing demand for alternative materials that do not have that problem.

Norman Baker: We may be repeating a previous discussion, but the problem of measuring only by weight is that it is a disincentive to using glass. It would encourage the market to use plastic, which is lighter, but that may not be the best environmental solution.

Michael Meacher: It depends. The problem of plastics is their non-biodegradability. That is precisely why they were invented. For certain functions, it is their non-biodegradability and non-wear and tear, even over long periods, that makes them so valuable. We are now finding that it is a problem when it comes to waste management. It would not be sensible to commit myself by saying that we should in all cases favour glass over plastic, because glass itself is a problem. We need to analyse the environmental impacts at each stage of a product's life cycle—manufacture, use and disposal. Indeed, the Department is trying to do so, not only with plastics but with other materials.
 The waste resources action programme was set up in 2001 to try to find alternative uses. It is working to develop markets for several materials, including plastics. The strategy unit report recommended that the role of WRAP be continued and expanded. We are concerting that in our response to the report, and we hope to publish our response very soon. 
 New clauses 13 to 16 deal with strategies for recycling and waste reduction; they would require each country of the UK to have a strategy for setting recycling targets for household, business and construction and demolition waste. The strategy would also have to cover the development of a mandatory doorstep recycling scheme and the development of the market for recycled materials. I fully agree with hon. Members that the issues dealt with in the clauses are very important, and we are dealing with them. The waste strategy set a target to reduce by 2005 the amount of commercial and industrial waste sent to landfill to 85 per cent. of that landfilled in 1998. 
 I am aware that industrial and commercial waste is so much larger a fraction of the total waste that goes to landfill; it is about four to five times that of household or municipal waste. Therefore reducing that amount is four to five times more important. However, there is an argument that the recycling of industrial and commercial waste is at a much higher level; I think that it is 45 per cent. That compares with a recycling level of household waste of 13 per cent. The year 2005 is approaching rapidly, and we should consider what further measures are needed beyond that.

John Hayes: I ask a genuinely inquisitive question to which I do not know the answer. [Interruption.] Yes, unlike most parliamentary questions. Is household waste generally more biodegradable than commercial waste? That is relevant to the growth of each of those sectors and to their effect on the problem. Perhaps the Minister will return to the Committee with an answer.

Michael Meacher: I certainly could not give an authoritative answer now. However, my instinct is that household and municipal waste is more biodegradable because it includes more organic material than industrial and commercial waste does. However, I am sure that my officials will be pleased to look into the matter, and I shall return to the Committee with an answer.
 Our aims on the landfill of commercial and industrial waste are supported by the increases in the landfill tax announced in the pre-Budget report in November 2002. Provisional data from the Environment Agency, which I do not believe have been made public before now, based on returns from licensed landfill sites suggest that the amount of industrial and commercial waste that goes to landfill may have decreased by about 8 per cent. between 1998–99 and 2000–01. That is an interesting statistic; it is the one area in which there has been a reduction. That is before the increases in landfill tax have started to bite, although there has been a modest escalator of £1 a year between 1999 and 2004. That is interesting because it suggests that industry and commercial offices are beginning to take the management and reduction of waste more seriously. If so, I certainly welcome it. 
 The waste strategy also introduced the principle of statutory recycling targets, and I have spoken enough about those already. We will consider what further targets may be necessary and how we can support them. We agree that substantial increases in kerbside collection will be needed to support increased recycling. Indeed, we cannot double and treble recycling without a major increase in such collection. The private Member's Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, Deptford seeks to make that universal, but my view is that we shall come very close to that simply as a result of the pressure exerted by the targets. I believe that we would need an increase in the level of kerbside collection in the order of 45 to 50 per cent. in parts of local authority areas.

Bill Wiggin: It is not as high as that.

Michael Meacher: Well, I shall ask my officials for the precise figure. I am not saying that that is the case in all parts of local authority areas, but my recollection is
 that 45 to 47 per cent. use kerbside collection, at least in part. The national waste minimisation recycling fund—driven by Government funding to support the council tax—is already helping to increase kerbside collection.

Gregory Barker: Surely we should be most concerned about the laggards—the last quartile of authorities—and those who are having problems, invariably because of the start-up costs involved and the lack of resources that results from the allocation of Government funds. Those authorities will need to be encouraged and coerced into action. For that reason, we need a national framework for kerbside collection.

Michael Meacher: I am fascinated, and slightly surprised, to see how the hon. Gentleman is getting into coercion. He told me during the lunch break that he was surprised to find me out-lassez-fairing him. He is certainly moving rapidly in the other direction.
 I am glad to say that I was right: the figure for partial or whole kerbside collection by local authorities is about 45 per cent. I entirely accept that, as in every process, those who are most resistant will require pressure, but the current pressures in the system will take us a long way in the right direction. As I have already said, we agree that there is a need to secure markets for recyclate. That is why we set up WRAP. 
 The hon. Member for Lewes spoke about fly tipping, an important and troubling issue. I concur with the figures that he produced, as I think they were drawn from my parliamentary answer. They are worrying: a total of 600,000 tonnes was fly-tipped at various sites throughout the country, which is hideously high. The hon. Gentleman said—his interpretation is not quite correct, although he said it considerately—that the Government were pursuing the right policy by increasing the landfill tax, but that it had made the situation worse. 
 There is no reason why an increase in the landfill tax should make landfilling worse, because one need not go into the countryside to get rid of waste. One can do it, legally and legitimately, by leaving it at the local authority civic amenity site, which is free for small businesses and households. Even bulky items can be deposited at such sites. An increase the in landfill tax should not, therefore, affect the availability of that form of disposal.

Norman Baker: That is true for individual householders, who often avail themselves of that facility. The problem lies with businesses. I do not know what national practice is but, in my constituency, the county council does not allow businesses to deposit huge amounts at household sites. The problems result from the evasion of landfill tax by businesses seeking not to incur those higher charges. Certainly, abandoned cars are not allowed on council waste sites.

Michael Meacher: The hon. Gentleman is right to say that local authorities are within their rights to impose some charge on small businesses, because civic amenity sites are primarily for individual
 householders. Authorities should consider whether that it is a wise policy, because it could deflect a certain amount of waste, which would otherwise have been taken by small businesses to civic amenity sites, into the countryside, where it is simply fly-tipped. There is no difference between us with regard to the problem. It is awful, and although I am not sure whether it is getting worse, I am prepared to concede that it may be. Many anecdotal stories suggest that it is, but there is little systematic data. The problem is how to catch the offenders; that is what we want to do.
 I also entirely agree that when we do catch people, we should impose deterrent penalties. My wife says that I am becoming increasingly punitive, but I believe that this is a matter of making people aware of the consequences of what they are doing. Why should the rest of us pick up the tab for them? I do not wish to be draconian, but the current penalties are derisory. Many companies and individuals are prepared to take the risk because the chances are that they will not be caught and that, even if they are, any penalty will be a very small fraction of their turnover. That is a ridiculous situation. I do not wish to tell judges what to do—no Minister dare enter into the arena with the Lord Chancellor. However, it is important that magistrates, who receive 96 per cent. of all cases, realise the significance of environmental offences. I have a constant battle to persuade the Magistrates' Association to get its members to take the matter seriously.

John Hayes: I think that we have found common cause on the matter, and I suspect that we also agree that those who are elected and accountable, rather than unelected judges, should take a lead in such matters. However, I shall not go down that philosophical avenue.
 It is right that we catch and penalise people who act in a flagrantly irresponsible way and cause enormous nuisance. It is also right that we should change the popular culture: the expectation of what is acceptable in terms of waste. How we do that is a challenge—it could be by information, education or other routes. It includes penalising people when they do wrong, but it also involves trying to encourage them not to do wrong in the first place. I hope that the Minister will address that.

Michael Meacher: Of course that is right. There is a strong consensus in the Committee that we need such a change of culture. As the hon. Gentleman rightly said, our parents and grandparents would not have dreamed of behaving in that way, and if they found their children doing so we would have had quite a hiding. I do not recommend bringing that back, but our local and national leadership, in all its forms, must change its attitude.
 In my constituency, come the local elections, a big concern is the British National party. However, that aside, the single issue that people are most concerned about is litter. They do not like living in a neighbourhood that is grotty and degraded and makes them feel bad about themselves. They need some leadership in tidying it up, and then they will begin to behave differently; it will create a virtuous spiral.

John Hayes: I do not want to take the Minister any further round his virtuous spiral. I can say with some authority, because I am, for the moment, the Conservative spokesman—on loan—on such matters, that the Opposition would be very supportive of the Minister in that respect as, I am sure, would be the Government. It is a cross-party issue because we have the same constituency pressures and the same correspondence. If appropriate measures are proposed, the Minister will have support from all parts of the House. I hope that he will have the courage to proceed. He will certainly have my backing.

Michael Meacher: The Government do have the courage to introduce legislation. It is called the Anti-social Behaviour Bill, and I shall come to it. However, it is not as though provisions are not already in place. It is often the exercise of provisions that is lacking. We already have legislation to deal with fly tipping. The key provisions are to be found in part II of the Environmental Protection Act 1990, and in the Refuse Disposal Amenity Act 1978. Other relevant primary legislation includes the Control of Pollution (Amendment) Act 1989, the Public Health Act 1961 and the Highways Act 1980.
 Some of those provisions may need to be amended, but one has only to read out a list of legislation to discover that the real problem is that it is not being used to anywhere near its full extent. It is not being policed; no one is detecting or apprehending those who are behaving badly; and when they are caught the penalties are not sufficient. The problem is not a lack of law; it is a lack of readiness and determination to do something about it. This is a cross-party issue. I cannot believe that any serious political party is not wholly behind us. The Anti-social Behaviour Bill— 
Norman Baker rose—

Hon. Members: Here we go.

Norman Baker: I am not about to say that I am not fully behind the Bill, so the Minister can cross that off his list of ammunition.
 It is not only those who drop litter who are responsible. I refer, for example, to fast-food restaurants that hand out meals in plastic trays, which can later be found lying in the roads in a half-mile radius around the restaurant. When travelling around the country, one can see where McDonald's is by marking the location of the boxes; in the middle of the circle, there will be a McDonald's restaurant. It is the same for the kebab shops in Lewes. What will the Government do about that? They should either encourage those companies to take responsibility for their litter—a producer responsibility—or ensure that those companies patrol the streets themselves rather than putting the bill onto the taxpayer.

Michael Meacher: I called in the leading management from the fast-food manufacturers to discuss that problem. Most of them assured me that they already had a voluntary code of conduct and that the area up to 100 m from their shops was regularly cleaned up by staff. [Interruption.] That is what I was told. It is not for me to say that it is not true, but it certainly does not work as seamlessly as they suggest.
 The answer, however, is exactly what the hon. Gentleman suggested: we need independent people on the ground, not only near fast-food shops, although they are the worst, but near fish and chip shops and others that generate a lot of waste. Those people should be independently monitored, and the responsibility has to be clearly identified and action taken. It is not impossible for local authorities to do that now. They have the power, and we have to activate them to act in that way. However, even local authorities will be deterred if the people whom they take to court are given only derisory fines.

John Hayes: I am reluctant to drag this up, but it is important. My constituents cannot understand why those organisations should pack their products in containers that are not disposable and biodegradable. Why cannot packaging be made of card or paper, which would degrade quickly even when discarded? Particular kinds of card or paper would degrade even more quickly, unlike plastic or polystyrene.
 With your indulgence, Mr. Amess, I wish to say that the problem does not occur only within 100 m of shops. Drive-through restaurants are a worse problem. People collect the food in their cars and discard the packaging half a mile away, or even, as I know from my rural constituency, in lanes two or three miles away. We all know where it has come from because it has the company's badge and name printed all over it.

Michael Meacher: I accept that, and I share the hon. Gentleman's outrage. I am extremely keen for action to be taken. My view remains, however, that that will not happen without litter wardens or environmental wardens—call them what you like—on the ground. They can detect people dropping packaging, and they can follow up incidents, checking the source and taking appropriate action.
 Of course, there is a cost problem associated with that, but the Government's policy is that the money from the penalties imposed on those who commit litter and, I think, dog-fouling offences can be recycled. For the life of me, I cannot see why more local authorities do not take up the opportunity that that policy would provide. We are piloting nine local projects to put people in such roles, and we are seeing what the consequences are. They remind me of parking wardens in Westminster; they are a source of considerable extra money and they deal extremely effectively with a serious social nuisance. The powers to take such steps are there, and we must ensure that they are used. 
 The Anti-social Behaviour Bill takes forward several important proposals to deal with fly tipping—believe it or not, that is where we started half an hour ago. They include extending to waste collection authorities—not the Environment Agency—the power to investigate incidents of unlawfully deposited waste. They also include the power to stop, search and seize vehicles that authorities suspect of being used unlawfully to deposit waste—a power currently available only to the Environment Agency. That is a modest but not insignificant extension of the powers of local authorities, which I welcome. We are considering what further measures 
 may be needed, and we intend to announce details later this year.

Norman Baker: Does the Bill allow for an increase in fines for fly tipping, particularly for businesses? When the Minister talks to the Magistrates' Association, will he draw to its attention, if he has not done so already, the relative costs of a fine—where people are caught and successfully prosecuted—and of depositing waste legally? Some of the fines that are handed out are less than the landfill tax.

Michael Meacher: The problem is not that the law reduces the potential for significant or big fines, but that the magistrates will not use them. The magistrates court can impose a fine of up to £20,000, although even I do not suggest that it should be more than that, except for very serious offences. I have asked how many £20,000 fines have been imposed in the past few years for littering or spreading waste on the highway, but I think that the figure is virtually nil. Magistrates are simply not using the powers that are available. If they think that the fine should be more than £20,000 for a very serious offence, they can find the offender guilty and pass him to the county court, which is allowed to impose up to two years' imprisonment, an unlimited fine or both. The powers are there; the issue is the judiciary's commitment to use them.
 I have examined various ways of dealing with the issue. I have been in regular touch with the Home Office about the work of the Sentencing Advisory Panel, which is studying guidelines on the appropriate penalty. I have had a meeting with the Magistrates' Association. We have issued new guidelines. I have written articles in the magistrates' journal. I am at a loss to know what more to do to push people. 
 The hon. Member for Lewes may be saying—he is reading my mind again—that we should have a minimum penalty in legislation. If I said so, I should immediately be told that the lawyers insist that that is not appropriate, because it does not take account of mitigating circumstances. One must therefore leave judges with some flexibility. 
 One can have a maximum penalty, but neither I nor the hon. Gentleman want that—I want higher penalties that act as a serious deterrent. I think that he will have to leave me to pursue the matter in the Government. I can give him an absolute assurance that I will not give up on it.

Anthony D Wright: May I just tell my hon. Friend that there might well already be opportunities for the local authorities to reduce the amount of fly tipping? For example, two years ago my local authority limited the free collection of bulky items to two from each household, which has led to a fivefold or sixfold increase in the incidence of fly tipping. That has created a massive problem in my constituency. There are already issues for local authorities to address outside the law and opportunities to take the initiative, rather than have requirements forced on them.

Michael Meacher: I very much agree with that. It is sensible to allow people some measure of flexibility so that they can get rid of bulky items, by refusing to collect them, for example. Alternatively, one could impose a charge of £10 for the removal of bulky items,
 which is what the Liberal Democrats did one year ago in Oldham, where, for the time being, they have a majority of one. That was unwise, because despite the increase in income, which is difficult to measure, I suspect that there has been a disproportionate loss in terms of people leaving around large bulky items or fly tipping. One should work with the grain of people who wish to comply with the law, and not put too many obstacles in their path.
 To conclude—hon. Members will be delighted—I agree on the importance of a strategy to deliver a more sustainable waste management system, which is why we have already developed a framework that is now in place and which we are trying to deliver. As hon. Members have heard me say—it is a boring record—the Bill is just one part of that delivery. 
 On the basis of that explanation and the interesting and valuable debate that we have had and on which I shall follow up, I hope that the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings will not press new clause 30.

John Hayes: In respect of new clause 30, my answer is that I will press it, although I accept much of what the Minister said, and do not intend to speak for very long because we have had a long, wide-ranging, interesting and helpful debate.
 The Minister's principal criticism of the amendments and new clauses was that they were too ambitious. However, if he reacquaints himself with new clause 30, he will have to agree that that is not so. That might be true of other new clauses and amendments—I will of course allow the hon. Member for Lewes to speak to his own new clauses. However, new clause 30 is not terribly ambitious, and is neither an insurmountable hill to climb nor an unreasonable target. To detach the Minister from his prepared text for a second, I remind him that new clause 30 says: 
''The Secretary of State shall . . . within twelve months put before Parliament a strategy to deliver a year on year decrease in the volume of waste sent to landfill that shall be commensurate with statutory reductions in the weight and volume of waste sent to landfill as required by Clause One''.
 That is, frankly, pretty sympathetic to the objectives of the Bill. Crumbs—requiring a ''year on year decrease'' is not asking the earth. Rather, it is asking for steady progress towards the targets that have been set for us and which are the driving factor behind the Bill. I see no great difficulty with that proposal—it is certainly not over-ambitious. Reporting progress to Parliament is simply a matter of proper scrutiny and an opportunity to debate the issues in the House and more widely. 
 The Minister talked about weight and volume and I take his point that there are difficulties and technical questions that one would need to examine closely. However, it would not be impossible to come to a sensible arrangement about volume, in which I should think a combination of technology and mathematics could be employed. I bear in mind the Minister's points on that subject, but I do not think that they are incompatible with the new clause because it is broad. It does not specify a ratio, as we did in earlier debate, but allows great flexibility; indeed, new clause 30 gives the 
 Secretary of State the opportunity to specify the formula that will accurately measure the significance of waste by volume against weight. 
 Although the vote will not take place right now, when the time comes we will press new clause 30 because it does not detract from the Bill one iota; in fact it adds to it. It would allow us to debate the matters more fully on Report. I am not sure that the Minister's principal criticisms of the other new clauses and amendments count as persuasively for new clause 30.

Michael Meacher: Very briefly, if the hon. Gentleman wishes to press the clause to a Division, he will do so. However, I ask him two questions. First, does he have an answer to the methodological problems of measurement by volume? Secondly, the clause calls on the Secretary of State to specify a formula
''which accurately measures the significance of waste by volume against waste by weight.''
 Why should that make any difference to the success of the strategy?

John Hayes: Those are very incisive questions, and I shall attempt to answer them. The first answer was given in my explanation: the clause specifies that the Secretary of State shall make the judgment about methodological issues. I accepted the Secretary of State's concerns about the methods, and he made some telling points. However, I find it difficult to believe that it is impossible; there must be a way through it, and it is important that we find it. If we abandon any consideration of volume by simply concentrating on weight—the Minister acknowledged the significance of the issue when it was first raised on Thursday—it will not receive the consideration that it is due.
 The answer to the second question is that it may be a growing problem. We do not know the relationship between weight and volume and how, or if, it affects the increase in waste. Unless we have some measurement, we will not be able to reach a conclusion about whether the challenges that we face on increased waste are principally problems of volume or of weight or both. If both, how do they relate to each other? The measurement is an attempt to assess the trend and the nature of the problem so that we can build it into the strategy. I acknowledge that the methodology would have to be examined closely and decided upon after proper consultation, scrutiny and analysis. Therefore, although I accept that there are difficulties, it would be useful to press the new clause to a Division so that we can debate those matters further at later stages of the Bill.

Norman Baker: This has been a very good, if long, debate, so I shall try not to detain the Committee. However, I suspect that we shall make rather faster progress once clause 17 has been dealt with. I argue the merits of the clauses in my name and in that of my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Sue Doughty). I shall not compare them with new clause 30, as that could be unduly divisive and inappropriate. The clauses on fly tipping cannot be called ambitious. Indeed, they are very unambitious; they are very
 modest clauses, and I am surprised that the Minister has not grabbed them with both hands. They merely ask for a strategy.
 Despite those frivolous comments, I thank the Minister for his comments on fly tipping. He has convinced me that he takes the matter seriously and that there could be restrictions for dealing with it elsewhere rather than in his Department. Therefore I shall not press our amendments to a Division, but I hope that in return the Minister might drop a line to all members of the Committee to let us know the progress on the points that I made and on those made by the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings about the materials used in fast food. Perhaps he will let us know what contact he has had with the Magistrates' Association and others, as there are matters outside his remit that affect fly tipping. It would be helpful if the Minister could give us an update on progress so that we know how far we are likely to get. I shall certainly mention the issues that have been raised this afternoon to my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Matthew Green), who is dealing with related matters on the Anti-social Behaviour Bill, so that he can raise them in that context, because it is important that an environmental impact assessment also takes place as part of that process. 
 The idea of zero waste is ambitious, but I make no apologies for tabling an amendment that is aspirational—a word that the Government use for targets that they do not intend to meet, such as those relating to renewable energy. It is right to put down a marker and say where we want to go. There is no harm in setting what might seem to be unrealistic targets, although I have no idea whether we will be able to meet them in 20 or 30 years. The other day I quoted Lenin, but I think it was Chairman Mao who said that a journey of 100 miles starts with a single step.

Alan Whitehead: That was Confucious.

Norman Baker: How could I make such a mistake—well, it was someone Chinese.

John Hayes: Presumably not from a Chinese takeaway.

Norman Baker: I would not take away either of those two characters.
 If we set aspirational targets, we may find that people respond in unexpected and helpful ways. For example, in California, a target was set for the use of petrol-free cars. Everyone said that it could not be done, but it was. Sometimes, it helps to set targets that look impossible, and in many ways, Californians have led the environmental movement.

Sue Doughty: As those of us who, for our sins, have been involved with such programmes know, some of these ideas about aspirational targets are borrowed from quality management and total quality management programmes. In the case of quality, defects are driven out until one gets as close to zero as possible. We are trying to work towards zero waste. It is rare to get total quality, but the constant process of working to keep on identifying the next slice
 of improvement is valuable. That is one of the original sources of the term zero waste.

Norman Baker: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who makes her point well and emphasises why aspirational targets are appropriate. No one has mentioned closed-link technology, except in passing, and I would like to see the Government pushing that, to ensure that industry creates no waste in the first place. If we could minimise the waste stream and minimise industry's costs, we would give this country a competitive edge. As we progress further into this century, environmental progress and environmental technology will be key drivers for the economy. We must be at the forefront of that. There are advantages all ways around from aspiring to a target of zero waste.
 The Minister rightly referred to the need to decouple economic growth concepts from waste production. It is important that we start thinking along those lines in a way that we have not done hitherto. 
 The Minister was also right to mention local authorities, because they can do a lot to recycle litter. I would not wish to adopt the laissez-faire attitude of new Labour or the Stalinist attitude of the Conservative party with regard to dictating to local government. There is a middle way between the two. I hope that if the Minister has not done so, he will think about issuing guidance to local authorities, not in a prescriptive way, but setting out the facts and figures, the powers that they already have and those that the Government are now giving them through other legislation. There is value in telling local authorities what they can do because they do not always know.

John Hayes: That is an extremely interesting suggestion. We have had a light-hearted but important debate. Given the strength of feeling on both sides of the Committee, regardless of party, I suggest that the Minister take that on board and once again issue guidance—I am sure that it is there already—to reinforce the message on the issues that have been raised.

Norman Baker: I should be grateful if the Minister would do that. He has heard both Opposition spokesmen advocating it. He would find it helpful. Perhaps he and his officials will consider how it can be done as part of the process of education.

Michael Meacher: I am very happy to do that without a commitment, because it could be that I find that guidance was issued six months ago—I cannot recall whether that is the case. I would like to think seriously about the suggestion. It would be valuable to alert local authorities to their powers and responsibilities and to see how far we can stimulate greater use of them. I shall consider the matter with my officials and make a statement later.

Norman Baker: That is typically helpful of the Minister, who is much loved by all of us on the Committee and beyond. He is not an isolated figure—he is admired by Liberal Democrats if not in Government circles, even though, for reasons that escape me, he made an uncharacteristically partisan point about Orders in Council. However, to pick up
 the point made by the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle, I would remind him that I tabled a parliamentary question some time ago asking why he was not in the Cabinet. That was when the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions was in place, with a Secretary of State in the Cabinet. The Transport Minister was then No. 2 in the DETR and to make a level playing field, the Environment Minister should have been put in the Cabinet, yet our Environment Minister was not. Apart from the qualities that he brings, it would indicate a wider respect for the environment by the Government. That is why I keep banging away about the fact that the Government's environmental record should be the Minister's environmental record. If I make a plea for him to be given a Cabinet position, I am sure that that will put the mochas on it once and for all.
 Lastly, in terms of bring and buy, I refer the Minister to the comments that I made on Second Reading. We want local sustainability, minimum transport movements and reuse of materials. The best example that I can give him is Harvey's brewery in my constituency. It produces fantastic local beer in Lewes and sells it locally in glass bottles with deposits. They are all returned to Harvey's. I shall be happy to supply the Minister with a bottle of Harvey's beer—if he does not regard it as a bribe—so that he can enjoy it and return the bottle to me to return to the brewery in due course. 
 Question put and agreed to. 
 Clause 17, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 18 - Strategy for Scotland

John Hayes: I beg to move amendment No. 73, in
clause 18, page 12, line 37, at end insert 
 'and must be in accordance with the Best Practicable Environmental Option.'.

David Amess: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:
 No. 74, in 
clause 19, page 13, line 25, at end insert 
 'and must be in accordance with the Best Practicable Environmental Option.'.
 No. 75, in 
clause 20, page 14, line 13, at end insert 
 'and must be in accordance with the Best Practicable Environmental Option.'.
 No. 76, in 
clause 24, page 16, line 21, at end insert— 
 '(6) In this Chapter ''Best Practicable Environmental Option'' or ''BPEC'' means the outcome of a systematic consultative and decisionmaking procedure which emphasises the protection and conservation of the environment across land, air and water. The BPEO procedure establishes for a given set of objectives, the option that provides the most benefits or the least damage to the environment as a whole, at acceptable cost, in the long term as well as the short term.'.
 I should point out that we shall debate the amendments. However, clauses 18, 19 and 20 will all be moved formally.

John Hayes: I hesitated in case my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle wanted to leap to his feet, but I have interrupted his research for the later stages of the Bill. These are straightforward amendments. I do not think that they will take quite as long as the matters that we have just discussed—I see Committee members nodding in agreement. They relate, essentially, to the affairs of Scotland and Wales. To that extent, they are designed as an addition—

Bill Wiggin: The ''Best Practical Environmental Option'' is surely that which my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire sought to achieve through the amendment. That was simply to ensure that at no stage did we see what we mentioned earlier—the dumping of recyclable material in landfill sites. The Minister has taken us through this, but we are back in the same old groove.
 I am sure that you will agree, Mr. Amess, that although it is a long intervention, it is important. We are seeking to achieve it in every authority in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. That is the reason for the amendments. I think that the Minister will agree that ''Best Practicable Environmental Option'' would be a helpful and useful addition, although he will doubtless sally forth with his usual comment—that the Bill does not need amending.

John Hayes: My hon. Friend won more brownie points in that short time than in the rest of the Committee's proceedings. He is right that the ''Best Practicable Environmental Option'', the phrase that my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire uses in the amendment, is a means of devising a systematic procedure to emphasise the protection and conservation of the environment across land and water—as explained in amendment No. 76. It should apply to Scotland and Wales, as well as to England. It would be a useful additional catch-all provision, an opportunity for us to say that the Bill is targeted at a range of objectives, but that the Bill's wider impact needs to be tested. This useful summary amendment would allow us to do precisely that.
 The procedure would establish a given set of objectives. The option would provide the most benefits for the least damage to the environment as a whole, with an acceptable cost in the long term as well as the short term. It is broad and deep; it would give us an opportunity to measure the overall impact of the Bill across a range of areas and over time. It is a strategic amendment, as suggested in previous discussions. The Opposition believe that it is important that the signals that we transmit should be part of a wider strategy. In that, we are close to the Liberal Democrats—as close as I ever want to be, but they take the same view. 
 I do not want to labour the point yet again, because, time and again, the Minister returns us to the ''Waste Strategy 2000'' and ''Waste Not, Want Not''. I assure him that we are aware of those documents and that we understand them. We do not argue that the Bill should replace either of them, and certainly not the strategy, but that it should interlock with them. 
 The Minister underestimates the need to telegraph or signal that message. I am concerned that the Bill 
 will be seen as excessively narrow. I hesitate to use the term again, but I will—I do not want the Bill to be seen as legislative cover. It should be seen as something of importance—in itself and in terms of its relationship with the bigger picture and the wider strategy. By allowing a procedure that facilitates a deeper and broader analysis, the amendment would help us achieve that bigger objective. To that end, I am delighted to commend the amendment.

Sue Doughty: I shall speak briefly. As the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings said, his party and mine are close on this matter. The ''Best Practicable Environmental Option'' is increasingly being adopted by councillors as a way of looking at their waste strategies. Clause 18 strengthens the tools that are available to them. We spoke earlier about many of the problems with the waste hierarchy, and incineration's place in that hierarchy. There are deep fears that large incinerators will be dotted across the country as a means to solve the problem of biodegradable municipal waste. If one considers the Bill without this clause, some of the strategies will seem more attractive than asking, ''What is the 'Best Practicable Environmental Option'?''
 The Conservative amendment strengthens the proximity principle and the holistic approach to waste management, which is better than saying, ''Shall we send this waste to landfill or to incineration?'' The amendment is useful, as is the fact that the party has picked up on the royal commission's definition of environmental pollution. We are happy to support the amendment. I have not seen where the BPEO definition is included in the English legislation; however, having seen it included for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, I may have missed the point at which the hon. Member for South Holland and the Deepings mentioned it. I stand corrected if it has been included elsewhere.

Bill Wiggin: What a delight it is to be called, Mr. Amess. As the hon. Member for Guildford said, the ''Best Practicable Environmental Option'' will add some weight to the Bill. I add my support for the amendment, although I cannot do so as eloquently as my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire would have done had he not had a damaged foot. The amendment would help the Bill, and I hope that the Minister will agree that to introduce these now widely accepted terms would be thoroughly constructive, and it would add tremendously to his gravitas.

Michael Meacher: I do not wish to encourage the hon. Member for Leominster too much.
 The BPEO is defined in amendment No. 76, so I need not repeat it. The definition derives from the 12th report of the royal commission on environmental pollution. It is a published and well recognised tool to aid decision making in areas that will affect our environment. 
 I strongly agree with the amendment, but there is no need to codify the definition of the BPEO in legislation. That would be disadvantageous, because it is a working definition in the same way as I said that the waste strategy is a working document. The BPEO 
 definition is not an authoritative exposition that is set in stone. It can change through experience or due to a change in the state of the natural environment. It is a way to think about issues that could be subject to change. None of that detracts from the definition's value. I understand the intention behind amendments Nos. 73 to 75, which would require the measures for achieving targets mentioned in strategies for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland to be in accordance with the BPEO. 
 The BPEO procedure was the guiding principle in the development of those strategies, and that tool continues to be used to inform their delivery. In England, ''Waste Strategy 2000'' uses the same definition as that used in the amendment. It gives specific advice on how decision makers can identify the BPEO. The Department's guidance for local authorities on municipal waste management strategies specifically mentions the need for what happens locally to be determined on the basis of the BPEO. ''Wise about Waste—National Strategy for Wales'' also uses the definition contained in the amendment, and that document identifies that BPEO methodology should be used in specific circumstances, such as when local authorities are preparing municipal waste management strategies or when local planning authorities are considering planning applications for waste facilities. 
 Scotland and Northern Ireland have yet to prepare their strategies to comply with the requirements of the landfill directive, although Scotland's current national waste plan and the Northern Ireland waste management strategy 2000 are both explicitly based on BPEO methodology. I assure the Committee that their strategies, as required under the Bill, will do the same. Used in the right way, BPEO methodology can be useful and effective. Each part of the UK has already recognised that fact and is using it to inform its strategy. On that basis, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will understand that the amendments are not necessary.

Bill Wiggin: I rise to my feet and thank the Minister. Does my hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings agree with the Minister's conclusions? If he does, I shall sit down quickly. I am grateful to the Minister for his comments, and I am glad that those matters have been taken into consideration. I am not sure whether we should be pressing this to a vote at this stage.

John Hayes: My hon. Friend is seeking a quid pro quo for an earlier intervention. My judgment is that the Minister has made helpful remarks, to which I referred when my hon. Friend sat down, but my inclination is that if my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire were here, he would be unlikely to put it to a vote.

Bill Wiggin: I am grateful for that intervention. In order to hear the rest of the comments that my hon. Friend is likely to make, I shall sit down.

John Hayes: That was most dextrous of my hon. Friend. The key point is the reference to the well accepted approach. The Minister properly acknowledged, that the BPEO is a well established
 and well respected means of assessing wider impact. My hon. Friend is anxious to insert it in the Bill, but, in a sense, it would be too demanding and it would constrain the Government and the Bill too tightly. We can debate the issue in the later stages of the Bill, and we may now seek a compromise—an acceptance that the BPEO should be taken into account or borne in mind—although I understand the Minister's reluctance to make a definitive commitment.
 If we were to gain from the Minister a suggestion—and I think that he has half-given it—that the Bill and its measures would be subject to such independent scrutiny but would not be constrained by it, that would be extremely positive and it would confirm my instinct not to press the matter to a vote. I do not know whether or not I am making myself clear. I understand why he would not want the BPEO included in the Bill, but we should not detach it entirely from our consideration of the Bill's implications and legislative requirements. The Minister may come back on that point or intervene, but on that basis, I do not want to press the matter to a vote.

Michael Meacher: I should be surprised if the hon. Gentleman pressed such a matter to the vote because the BPEO, as I indicated, is already widely used. It is used by two of the four countries within the UK, and the other two are expected to start using it this year. It follows a practice that was set down as a procedure by the royal commission and is exhaustively used by the Environment Agency. There is no dispute about it. The only issue is that including in legislation would not be wise because it would encase too rigidly in stone what is meant to be a dynamic concept. The BPEO is relative to the exact circumstances of the case. It cannot be described in a generality that applies whatever the circumstances. So long as it is widely, if not universally, accepted—there are no problems with its application so far as I know—it is best to leave it as it is and not to include it in the Bill.

John Hayes: The Minister has satisfied my inquiry. Our thought was that it was widely used and had application to the Bill. It is the background against which the Bill is painted, and it will be adopted by the other parts of the UK, which is why my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire proposed the amendments applying the concept not just to England but to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. I fully understand the Minister's point. We would not want to fix the concept in stone; it is dynamic rather than static. The environment itself changes, so measurement in broad environmental terms is bound to be a moving target. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
 Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. 
 Clause 18 ordered to stand part of the Bill. 
 Clauses 19 and 20 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 21 - ''Biodegradable waste'' and ''municipal waste''

Sue Doughty: I beg to move amendment No. 78, in
clause 21, page 14, line 41, leave out 'such as' and insert 'including, but not exclusively'.

David Amess: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:
 No. 79, in 
clause 21, page 14, line 42, leave out 'and'.
 No. 80, in 
clause 21, page 14, line 43, at end insert 
 ', and certain plastics designed specifically to degrade within a period of 12 months'.

Sue Doughty: The purpose of the amendments is to recognise that the scope for biodegradable waste has increased in the last few years. We used to think of it merely as food and garden waste and paper and paper board, but new technologies have created packaging, in particular, from other materials. One hears about packaging made from potato starch, which is biodegradable, and plastic carrier bags that can degrade within the year. I worry that we talk about biodegradable municipal waste without really knowing what it is. We all know what garden waste and food waste look like. However, with the packaging and other materials that are coming into use, we do not know what is biodegradable. Our purpose in adding the words
''certain plastics designed specifically to degrade''
 was to draw attention to the fact that some materials are creeping into common use and to ask whether they are part of the biodegradable waste that we are counting.

John Hayes: My contribution will be in the form of two questions. The Minister may be able to answer them now. If not, I hope that he will either answer them in writing or come back to the Committee. They relate to the first and second parts of the clause.
 The hon. Member for Guildford referred to the first of my questions, which relates to the changing nature of biodegradable waste and how it is defined. Just as the Minister said in our last discussion, these things are dynamic, both in the processes that can be employed to assist with waste disposal, which are constantly changing, and in the nature of the materials with which we are dealing. New materials are being developed all the time—for example, plastics are becoming more biodegradable in some cases and less hazardous in others. What impact is that likely to have on the steps that we need to take to meet the requirements of the Bill? That will have an impact on recovery, reuse and recycling. Can the Minister give us more detail about the changing nature of biodegradable waste? 
 My second question relates to municipal waste, although, again, I do not expect the Minister necessarily to have the information to hand. I want to know how municipal waste is changing. As lifestyles, technology and the materials that we use change, so does the typical municipal waste bin. To use the Minister's phrase, what goes into wheelie bins now will be quite different from what went into them five, 10 or 20 years ago. We must have a profile of waste so that we can reach proper conclusions about how to deal with it. Unless that profile is accurate—again, I accept that this is a dynamic issue—it is hard 
 to reach conclusions about the Bill's likely effectiveness. 
 So, I am seeking information about biodegradability, the waste profile and the relevant trends. I would be grateful if the Minister could pick up those matters.

Bill Wiggin: I have a short question. We are dealing with the definition of biodegradable waste, but at what point is biodegradable waste biodegraded? At what point is it no longer biodegradable? Is there such a definition? In my constituency, a tremendous company called Biorganics runs a composting scheme. It deals largely with feathers from the Sun Valley factory, which is just inside the Hereford constituency. One of the factory's big problems is the huge amount of feathers that it produces, because it has no way of dealing with them. They are made of keratin, which does not naturally break down, which is why one sees feathers lying round the countryside. However, the scheme allows compost to be produced—at least, that is the generic term. In fact, it is a sort of soil, which is used on the fields. It is a tremendous fertiliser.

Hugh Robertson: For growing chickens?

Bill Wiggin: My hon. Friend teases me.
 Unfortunately, the composting process is rather smelly. It produces a strong smell of ammonia, which upsets the residents of Stoke Prior and to which they are quite sensitive. 
 As I said, therefore, I am curious to know at what point during the process biodegradable waste is biodegraded. I hope that the Minister can tell me, because it would be helpful to know. 
 I am also curious about the scheme under which councils may find it useful to encourage householders to put their compostable waste in a green bag and have it taken away, rather than composting it themselves in their garden. Councils, as municipal authorities, may be tempted to increase the amount of biodegradable waste that they compost rather than preventing it from going in the bin in the first place.

John Hayes: There is an interesting point, which my hon. Friend may want to tease out of the Minister. Has a model been produced to assess the effectiveness and efficiency of that scheme? An earlier amendment referred to providing composters to householders and raised the issue of whether that might not be an appropriate way of encouraging the proper and responsible treatment of waste. I worry slightly that the alternative of providing a facility where people can have materials composted for them is less effective. It will certainly mean more journeys, and it will be a bigger process. If things are dealt with on site, they will obviously be dealt with more quickly and efficiently. Have the Department or the Minister produced a model to assess the scheme?

Bill Wiggin: I am grateful for that. I was about to make those very points myself, and now I no longer need to—without scraping the bottom of the wheelie bin, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle was teasing me earlier.
 I hope that the Minister will address those two important points. First, there is the point about when biodegradable waste is no longer biodegradable. Secondly, what happens if the definition does not encourage people to use their council in relation to composting? I am talking about people who have the chance of composting material themselves, rather than people—perhaps living in a block of flats—who are not in a position to have even a communal composter or wormery.

Alan Whitehead: The hon. Gentleman may like to know that some research—I do not know the exact references—was carried out by local authorities some while ago, following the distribution of composters. The results showed that only something like 10 to 15 per cent. of people to whom composters were distributed used them as composters. There were many other uses: rabbit hutches, storage for tools and old running shoes and so on. However, the actual use of composters as such was fairly low. I am sure that he will want to take that into account.

Bill Wiggin: I am grateful for an intervention that was both light-hearted and important. Composters are, as hon. Members probably know, a type of dustbin into the top of which material for compost can be put. Compost is readily available at the bottom. The problem with composters is that many people just have a pile. I believe that at Barker Towers, where my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle lives, there are many compost heaps—that is what he was whispering to me earlier. People would normally have a compost heap, rather than a composter. If people are using composters for storing tools and a variety of other purposes, that is a shame. I hope that every effort will continue to be made to encourage people to have a compost heap of their own.

Michael Meacher: The amendments are about matters of definition, although one would not have guessed that from the debate. Not only was I asked earlier about an algebraic formula, but I am now being asked about when biodegradable waste is biodegraded. I am not sure that I can answer those questions, so I shall turn to the amendments.
 The amendments would amend the definition of biodegradable waste in the clause by replacing the words ''such as'' with ''including, but not exclusively''. They also remove an ''and'' and add at the end of subsection (1) 
''and certain plastics designed specifically to degrade within a period of 12 months''.
 On the first point, we can argue about the meaning of words, but the words ''such as'' mean the same as, but are better than, ''including, but not exclusively''. I am not sure about the force of the argument for making the change. The key point—I shall also argue this about definitions of biodegradable waste—is that the words in the Bill are used in the landfill directive definition. That is important, because, as I keep on saying, we are concerned with meeting our requirements under article 5(2) of the directive. For that reason, I cannot accept amendment No. 78. 
 The changes proposed in amendments Nos. 79 and 80 would also result in the definition in the Bill being 
 different from that in the landfill directive. They would extend the list of examples of biodegradable waste to include specifically 
''plastic designed . . . to degrade within a period of 12 months''.
 What does the phrase in the amendment mean? Does it mean completely degrade, partially degrade, or that the process of degradation has begun? That is one difficulty. The real point is that the amendment is unnecessary: to the extent that any waste is capable of anaerobic or aerobic decomposition, it will be biodegradable. It is not necessary for such waste to be expressly included in the clause.

Gregory Barker: If one is to create useful compost, it is imperative that one is discerning about the materials that are composted and separating them out. If one simply uses any material that is capable of being composted or biodegraded, one ends up with something dangerous. I am thinking particularly of cooked foods, which are often mistakenly put into kitchen composters. That is probably the most common example. I wonder how the definitions will help to inform a strategy that, in turn, will help to inform a wider public about how we ensure that what we compost serves a useful purpose, rather than simply becoming problematic.

Michael Meacher: I do not believe that the definitions in the landfill directive or the Bill will answer the sort of problems to which the hon. Gentleman referred. The problems are relevant, and are answered by having an organic standard for composting. We spent several months last year producing an organic standard that we finally published. It was subject to widespread consultation with the Composting Association and stakeholders about what was good quality, recognised organic composting. That has now been agreed and is established, and is the answer to the hon. Gentleman's question.
 There was also the problem of animal by-products being put into home composting. After foot and mouth, the Government were extremely concerned that no action should be taken that might resurrect foot and mouth in this country. On the other hand, we were criticised because the exclusion was so wide that home composting was completely discouraged. We sought through a European Union regulation to try to find the right balance between the two. We want to encourage home composting, but without any risk of human or animal disease. 
 The definition of biodegradable waste in the Bill is, as I said, derived from the landfill directive. It is important that the definitions are the same, as the objective of the landfill allowance scheme is to meet the targets set in article 5(2) of the directive. A wider definition would complicate the system and disconnect it from the landfill targets in the directive. In order to demonstrate that we have met our obligations under the directive, our report to the Commission would have to submit figures using the directive definition. At the very least, that would create unnecessary complications for the monitoring authority, as it would need to collect figures covering both definitions. It would also bring further pressure to bear on disposal authorities, which I am not sure is the 
 intention. A narrower definition would mean that we had failed to implement the directive fully, and would leave us open to infraction proceedings. The amendment carries that risk to the extent that it seeks to introduce a time limit on when waste can decompose. 
 We should stick closely to the definitions in the directive. I cannot answer biological questions about the nature of biodegradability, although I could get experts to answer them. However, that is not the point. However they are answered, the important point is that we keep close to the directive. I almost said that we are required to do so whether it is right or wrong, because that is what we are required to do by law. I cannot accept the amendment for those reasons.

Bill Wiggin: The Minister is asking what we do when waste has been biodegraded by some other method. In the case of the feathers, which I described earlier, it is soil, which is then put on a field. It could be put in a hole in the ground, which might be construed as landfill. That is why the definition is important, because the sort of landfill that soil and feathers represent is not the sort of landfill that we are talking about in the Bill. However, the example is still valid, which is why the definitions are critical.

Michael Meacher: I understand the hon. Gentleman's point. The waste acceptance criteria define inert waste. If biodegradable waste is treated so that it meets that definition, it ceases to be biodegradable waste, which answers the hon. Gentleman's point. Any plastic capable of anaerobic or aerobic composition is biodegradable waste, to which amendment No. 80 relates, and will be biodegradable waste according to the definition in the clause. I hope that the hon. Member for Guildford will be satisfied by that explanation and does not need to pursue the amendment.
 On the main thrust of this group of amendments, however, I repeat that the matter is not about substantive policy issues but definitions, which I insist must be close, if not identical, to those in the landfill directive.

Sue Doughty: I thank the Minister for that clarification, which was what we were seeking. We were concerned about what falls inside and outside the category of biodegradable, yet the Minister took an interesting and helpful angle on that question, and tied it back to the original objectives of the Bill, which we all support. Having received that answer, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
 Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Sue Doughty: I beg to move amendment No. 81, in
clause 21, page 15, line 4, after 'waste', insert 'collected by collection authorities'.

David Amess: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:
 No. 82, in 
clause 21, page 15, line 5, after 'waste', insert 'collected by collection authorities'.
 No. 83, in 
clause 21, page 15, line 6, at end insert— 
 '(c) and is in the case of (a) and/or (b) recorded for official purposes as such'.

Sue Doughty: One might think that inserting the words ''collected by collection authorities'' would be an obvious thing to do. However, we are concerned, because councils have had a lot of problems in measuring their recycling levels. There has recently been an outbreak of sparring between political parties, as each has tried to prove that it is the greenest. The definition of how waste is measured has changed as the years have gone by. As each council tries to prove that it is green and that its recycling figures are on the gentle upward path, other parties come along, take advantage of the fact that the definition has changed and say, ''No they're not.'' Everything depends on how one counts things, as opposed to whether the general thrust is towards increased recycling, and we have been concerned about that.
 We wish to define waste from households as municipal waste that is ''collected by collection authorities''. However, that waste could also be that which is collected at municipal waste facilities or dumped waste that is collected. Such distinctions are important when we try to define the figures. With the amendment we are trying to clarify the exact point at which household waste becomes biodegradable municipal waste and counted for those purposes. The worst example might be the problem of home composting. An estimate used to be made of the amount of waste that went to composting and was included in figures as a generally agreed rate. Now, however, councils are not sure what effect that has on the overall figures and what is sent to recycling. 
 There is still the problem of how to reward councils that encourage households by giving them cones and composters. We do not see that waste, because although people are being virtuous and filling up their composters nicely with it, it does not go anywhere to be recycled because it is not even collected in the first place. The amendment seeks clarification on how such waste is counted so that when councils look at their performance figures, they know the exact point at which it becomes material sent for recycling.

Michael Meacher: The amendment would amend the definition of municipal waste in subsection (3) by limiting it to waste that is ''collected by collection authorities'' and recorded as such. As I have said many times, and again a only few moments ago, the landfill allowances scheme that the Bill would establish is designed to implement the requirements of article 5(2) of the landfill directive. We must not do anything that could result in the United Kingdom's under-implementing the directive. In order to do that, we must, as I said in the previous debate, ensure that our definitions are consistent.
 Not all waste is collected by collection authorities. Waste disposal authorities have a duty to arrange for places where residents can deposit household waste and for the disposal of that waste. The amendments would result in such waste being excluded from the 
 landfill allowances scheme, even when it falls within the definition of biodegradable municipal waste. That could leave us open to infringement proceedings brought by the Commission. 
 I am not sure what the amendments want to achieve by requiring waste to be recorded before it falls into the definition of municipal waste. That would seem to narrow the definition and could lead to infringement proceedings. Solid municipal waste arisings are already recorded and will continue to be so. Municipal waste sent to landfill will also be recorded, as will the amount of such waste diverted to other forms of waste management. All the figures will be supplied to the monitoring authority to enable proper checks to be made, so I submit that there is no need to add the requirement to the definition. 
 The hon. Lady may have been tabled the amendments to probe what lay behind the provisions. I hope that I have given her an adequate explanation and that she will not press the amendments.

Sue Doughty: I thank the Minister for his response. He is right to say that the amendments are probing, because the issues have caused many problems to councils in trying to establish what they are and are not collecting. We have had various discussions about collection and disposal authorities, the interface between the two and how we can co-ordinate their efforts to exploit best what the directive is trying to do. We all want that, but we do not want to fall over on the definition.
 The Minister's answer was helpful because if he had said something else, we might have found that we were excluding material. However, his answer implies that we want to include as much in the counting as possible. That is what we wanted to determine, so I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment. 
 Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. 
 Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

John Hayes: I raised a couple of significant questions in the debate on the first group of amendments. The Minister properly did not respond to them because, as he implied in his response, they were really stand part points, so I shall raise them now. I shall repeat them for his convenience, and he may want to address them.
 My first point is about the nature of biodegradable waste. As I said, that is dynamic, as the contents of a waste bin are changing, and, because technology is changing, things are now biodegradable that were not before. Processes are improving, and it would be useful to have some feel for how that is happening. What are the trends? What is the current picture and what is it likely to be in a year or five years? If we are going to have the strategy we all want, we will need to set targets, and we will need to set them against the trends. Is there a model for that, and is the Minister aware of it? 
 My second related point is about subsection (3), which defines municipal waste. If we are going to make a judgment about whether the nature of biodegradability is changing, we must make a 
 judgment about the profile of the average household's waste. It may be getting bigger or smaller, or it may be that the balance of waste is changing. Lifestyle issues may have had an impact on that during the past decade or more. I do not want to speak too much about my childhood, as it makes me sound as if I am lost in a halcyon past, but in the golden age when there were only ever Conservative Governments and television programmes were so much better, I suspect that the average waste bin was rather different. Again, there are probably models of that, and if we are going to meet the targets, I would be interested to know what measurements have been made of the change in waste profile and how it affects them. 
 Those are specific and testing issues, and I appreciate that the Minister may not have the information readily to hand, though perhaps he does, judging by what he is reading. If he wishes to return to the Committee later with the information or send it in writing, I would be satisfied.

Michael Meacher: I apologise to the hon. Gentleman; he did raise the issue earlier. I made a note of it and failed to respond to my own note. The definition of biodegradability does not change. I think that the hon. Gentleman is asking about the nature of biodegradable waste and the trends in it. The main components of municipal waste are paper, cans, glass, textiles and disposable nappies. Trends develop over time, but I do not have the information to hand. However, I will endeavour to collect it and make a statement at the beginning of the next sitting on 29 April.

John Hayes: That is most helpful. I am sure that the Minister has accepted that I asked the questions for a good reason, and I am grateful to him.
 Question put and agreed to. 
 Clause 21 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 22 - ''Landfill''

Norman Baker: I beg to move amendment No. 84, in
clause 22, page 15, line 8, after 'land', insert 
 'both solid rock and sedimentary deposits, including soil'.

David Amess: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:
 No. 85, in 
clause 22, page 15, line 15, at end insert 
 ', provided that this waste is not subsequently sent to landfill at that same site.'.
 No. 15, in 
clause 22, page 15, line 19, leave out 'three years' and insert 'one year'.
 No. 86, in 
clause 22, page 15, line 20, leave out 'one year' and insert 'three months'.
 No. 87, in 
clause 22, page 15, line 21, after 'deposit', insert 'and/or storage'.

Norman Baker: With good will on both sides, it should be possible to deal with this group of amendments quickly. They are disparate amendments that have been grouped together, so each will require an explanation. Amendment No. 84 is simply a probing amendment to establish the Minister's definition of land, as it is important to clarify that. We have suggested a possible definition. Amendment No. 87 is an attempt to tidy up what could be an ambiguous arrangement in clause 22(3), by inserting the word ''storage.''
 Amendment No. 85 expresses our concern that a possible abuse could be built into the Bill because clause 22(2)(a) allows for the temporary storage of waste, but clause 22(2)(b) speaks of waste being deemed suitable for disposal. It is possible, with a site that is doubling as a waste transfer site as well as a landfill site, that waste received for landfill could, if it is convenient for reaching targets, be classified as waste that is being stored. That could happen even if the intention is to deposit it in landfill elsewhere on the site or even at the place where it is being stored. That loophole should be closed. I hope that the Minister will respond to that. 
 Amendments Nos. 15 and 86 seek to reduce the time that waste can be held in limbo. They seek to 
 avoid possible abuses in the classification of waste. It may be possible for waste to be held under clause 22(2)(d) for up to a year before it is disposed of. The receiver of the waste ought to know quite quickly whether it is to be disposed of or not. If it is to be disposed of, what is the point of storing it on site for a year? That opens a possible loophole. Clause 22(2)(c) speaks of 
''the storage of waste, prior to recovery or treatment, for a period of less than three years as a general rule''
 That is excessive. How will such waste be held for the three years? Is that counted for the purposes of the Bill as waste that has been subject to treatment or disposal, and therefore recovery—waste that has been dealt with effectively, as is the Bill's intention? Or is it treated as waste held, or waste that is in effect landfill because it is being held without being recovered or recycled? There is a loophole in that respect that needs to be closed.

David Amess: I wish the Committee a happy Easter.
 Debate adjourned.—[Mr. Ainger.] 
 Adjourned accordingly at Five o'clock till Tuesday 29 April at five minutes to Nine o'clock.